


The Purple Collection

by MachaSWicket



Category: Arrow (TV 2012)
Genre: F/M, Gen, RIP Prince, a collection of ficlets inspired by prince, all prince all the time, may include character death (will be marked), may include smut (will be marked), this is apparently how i'm dealing with my sadness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-07
Updated: 2016-05-07
Packaged: 2018-06-06 20:58:46
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 7,317
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6769657
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MachaSWicket/pseuds/MachaSWicket
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>SUMMARY:  In the spirit of the Collection To Be Named Later, a collection of unrelated ficlets, AU, UA, missing scenes, post-eps, etc., all of which are inspired in some way by Prince's music. </p><p>First chapter functions as the table of contents.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**The Purple Collection**

**2\. There Must Be Something Wrong with the Machinery** : Olicity AU, meeting online

 **3\. Never Seen a Pretty Girl Look So Tough** : Olicity AU, librarian/patron

 **4\. Without You There Is No Sea, There Is No Shore** : _**major character death**_ , olicity AU, one diagnosed with a terminal illness, future fic, angst

 **4\. Something About the Clouds and Her Mixed** : Olicity AU, hiker/paramedic


	2. There Must Be Something Wrong with the Machinery: Olicity AU, meeting online

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> truemyth asked: Oooh, Ship meme: Oliver/Felicity "meeting online au," because I could totally see Felicity hacking an online dating site just for giggles to see who she's really been matched up with and being so confused when she realizes that "Mr.BullsEye" or whatever is the son of her boss, recently returned from the dead.

 

**There Must Be Something Wrong with the Machinery**

 

The first message leaves Oliver puzzled.

_Please stop catfishing on Tinder._

Because first, he’s not sure what fishing has to do with the dating site his sister suggested as part of her ongoing crusade to help him heal from his traumas. And secondly, he hasn’t logged onto the site in at least a week or so, and he _certainly_  hasn’t tried to connect with anyone on there. So how is someone messaging him?

But there it is – a message from someone with a username he can’t even pronounce. _Shadkhnte_? He’s puzzled, and when he clicks on her profile, it’s somehow blocked. All he can see is the miniaturized version of her picture in the small icon beside her message – she seems cute and blonde, and that’s all he can really tell without some kind of magnifying glass.

It’s nearly eleven o’clock at night. Diggle already headed home, and Oliver just finished his workout. He should really try to get some sleep, or at least work on upgrading the lair a little bit. Instead, he stands near the small worktable and stares at his phone, strangely curious about that catfish-related message and the blonde who sent it. Oliver can’t explain exactly why he answers, but he does. _Is that some strange variation on “there are other fish in the sea”?_

It doesn’t take her long to respond: _No, it’s a variation on don’t be a jerk and use fake pictures to lure unsuspecting women with someone else’s sexy abs_.

Oliver blinks at the screen. Before he can come up with a response, she adds: _My syntax was confusing. But you know what I mean._

He’s still shaking his head in confusion when she messages again:  _The women aren’t using someone else’s abs, you are. That’s what I meant._

He frowns at his phone, because -- what the hell is she even talking about? _Are you suggesting my pictures are fake?_  he types. After considering that for a moment, he adds: _And I still don’t understand what that has to do with catfish_. Then he puts the phone down, turning to look at the workout space. He’s been considering adding a heavy bag, but hasn’t quite decided where it should go.

His phone chirps and he barely hesitates before scooping it back up to check. The tiny blonde wrote: _OMG, have you been living under a rock the last few years? There’s a whole movie about it and I think a TV show_.

He smirks at the phone as he types, _There’s a movie about my abs?_

He’s impressed how quickly she responds with: _There’s a movie about guys like you, yes:[http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Catfishing](http://t.umblr.com/redirect?z=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.urbandictionary.com%2Fdefine.php%3Fterm%3DCatfishing&t=MWJkOTk0ZGU0OTIyZDEwYmI4MjJhMDUzYTQ5OTIyZWRhNWFiYTY5MyxsdTRJaFJiOA%3D%3D)_

Oliver takes a moment to click her link, scanning the explanation. And then he started to feel offended; angry in a way he hasn’t been in a long time. Because Oliver is a lot of things -- a lot of awful, unappealing things, to be honest -- but he would never, ever catfish someone. Angrily, he types, _I’m not a predator. I’m not a liar, either_.

Except that isn’t entirely true. Oliver has, after all, told hundreds of lies to keep his identity a secret -- but he would never treat women so callously. Hell, part of the reason he went along with Thea’s Tinder plan is so that he can maybe plan uncomplicated sex with no expectations going in; none of that grasping desperation to _land Ollie Queen_  on women’s faces that he still sees when he’s out with Tommy to keep up appearances. The idea of prearranged hookups appeals to him precisely  _because_  he can’t allow himself to get close to a woman that he’d have to lie to about his mission.

The phone chirps and he grabs it, reading:  _You cropped most of “your” face out of your user pic and “your” abs are something out of Cosmo_.

Irritably, Oliver scans the app, looking for -- “Ah-ha!” he says, pleased. And then he hits the camera icon and lifts the phone up, angling it down to capture his shirtless, still slightly sweaty torso. When he looks at the resulting picture, he realizes it caught most of his face, which, as this little blonde woman notes, he’s been careful to keep off of his profile. But in the moment, he’s too full of righteous indignation to care. So he sends the picture to her with the message,  _I’m not lying_.

He stands there, glaring down at his phone, waiting for her inevitable response.

Only nothing happens. 

Frustrated, Oliver tosses his phone aside and heads to the mats. A quick set of pushups does nothing to alleviate his temper, and he checks his phone again. Still nothing. He types, _No apology_?

It takes another thirty seconds or so before she responds, _Actually, you should be thanking me -- I just secured your profile to protect your identity, Mr. Queen._

 _Excuse me?_  he types back. And goddamn, why did he send that picture with his face visible? He _knows_  better. And then the rest of her message sinks in, and he types, _Wait, secured how? What are you talking about?_

 _I’m a hacker. I hack things,_ she replies. Again, unnervingly quickly -- how can she type so fast? Another message arrives not ten seconds after the first: _Like Tinder, for instance. So just maybe don’t link sex apps to your unlimited Amex in the future._

Oliver wants to ask about the “sex apps” remark -- like is she on Tinder for hookups? -- but is more appropriately focused on the low thrum of unease in his chest. _Is this you saying you stole my credit card information?_

He taps the side of his phone anxiously as he waits. Her response: _This is me saying I tweaked the program to ensure no one ELSE can steal your credit card info._

He sighs, resigning himself to canceling the card, when she adds, _I’m a hacker, not a thief. I have a perfectly good job that pays me a fair salary and I don’t need to steal from the boss_.

Wide-eyed, Oliver tries to come to terms with the idea that someone at QC just found him on Tinder and possibly stole his credit card information. He’s pretty sure that information would get someone a significant payday from TMZ. 

He can only imagine the headlines. **Former Playboy Trolls Internet for Sex** “Fuck.” 

His phone chirps and he reads her latest response warily.  _Not *boss*. Just -- I work at QC. So clearly we should stop talking. Best of luck, sir._

Oliver’s shaking his head as he replies, _Wait a second--_

But the conversation between him and this mystery blonde disappears, like she managed to erase it from existence. “What the hell?” he asks the lair, which of course does not answer. And then he’s fumbling through Tinder, still not fully understanding the interface, trying to find the QC hacker with the username he can’t remember.

Not surprisingly, his inept attempts don’t produce anything resembling results. 

He tells himself it’s a security concern when he pulls up the QC employee list. He reassures himself that he’s being smart, not obsessive, when he reaches out to Walter, asking for the brightest minds in the QC tech departments -- someone who could fix a laptop for him.

When he finds her cubicle two days later, he takes a moment to study her -- blonde hair pulled into a simple ponytail, pink blouse, statement glasses. He feels an unfamiliar warmth in his chest, a strange kind of longing. Still, right up until she turns around, he lets himself believe this is about anything other than sheer, insistent curiosity about the woman who found out who he was and decided to _protect_  him; the woman who erased her profile from Tinder instead of trying to use the information she has on him to get something for herself.

Oliver has loved and been loved by a few genuine women in his life, but he grew up _Ollie Queen, playboy billionaire_ , and the reaction of this particular woman to his identity leaves him burning with the need to learn more about her. From just this little hint of her, he already genuinely likes her. Which is almost intimidating. 

So he takes an unsteady breath and says, “Felicity Smoak?” 

Her eyebrows jump up, blue eyes wide behind those glasses, and her pink lips make a perfect ‘O’ of surprise as she stares at him.

He quirks an eyebrow. “Hi, I’m Oliver Queen.” 

-30- 

_Note: _Shadkhnte is Yiddish for [female] matchmaker, according to the Googles.__


	3. Never Seen a Pretty Girl Look So Tough: Olicity AU, librarian/patron

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> lerayon asked: 25-Olicity. Sexy librarian!oliver, please!
> 
> Ohhhh, this is interesting… Note: @meri47 and Anonymous also submitted this prompt - thanks!

 

**Never Seen a Pretty Girl Look So Tough**

 

Felicity sucks in a deep breath and then walks into the library. Shoulders back, chin up. Her newly blonde hair (and still sort of smelling like bleach) is tied up in a ponytail swinging to the beat of her footsteps on the marble flooring. “Confidence,” she murmurs to herself.

She feels chased; hunted. But she needs to not be _that_  Felicity anymore -- not the hacktivist Goth girl with the reckless pretty-newly- _ex_ -boyfriend who got them burned. _Again_. No, she’s... some other Felicity now. A confident, polished,  _blonde_  Felicity, with heels that click against the floors in a pattern that sounds like her mother. 

God, she misses her combat boots. So practical. So comfortable.

Today she is rocking a totally different look, and trying like hell to make a bright floral sundress feel like armor. Results are mixed so far, but she presses on.

And suddenly she’s at the main circulation desk, staring blankly at a middle-aged brunette wearing really great horn-rimmed glasses. “Can I help you?” the librarian asks quietly.

Felicity leans her elbows on the desk, all practiced insolence and disrespect for authority. Then she corrects herself, because that’s _old_  Felicity. She jerks back upright and only wobbles slightly in her heels. Seriously, _how_  did her mother wear these day in and day out?

“Miss?” the librarian prompts, the slightest hint of impatience in her voice.

“Right!” Felicity winces, and continues in a lower voice. “Sorry. Computers?”

The librarian points to Felicity’s left. “Straight through there, towards the Art History section. They’re first come, first serve.”

Felicity thanks the librarian and saunters off. Or she _would_  have sauntered were she wearing her beloved boots; in these heels, she treads much more carefully, because her center of balance feels somehow both wrong and uncertain. 

When Felicity finds the small computer section, she makes a strangled noise of protest. They’re _desktops_ , and old ones at that – all aging beige plastic and audible cooling fans. “What a disappointment,” she mutters. It’ll physically pain her to work on one of these clunkers, but she needs anonymity, so she turns to the small circulation desk tucked between the art history and computer sections and asks the man leaning against it: “How do I get onto one of these monstrosities?”

The librarian looks up and she is temporarily struck dumb, because he’s all implausible hotness with his cropped hair and stubbly jaw and broad shoulders in a soft blue sweater that is clearly cashmere and expensive. It’s an _old money_  kind of aesthetic that hasn’t really caught her attention in the past, but it is surely working for him. Even the puzzlement on his face when he looks at her is strangely attractive. “Excuse me?” he asks. His voice is low and rough and vaguely hypnotic.

She gives herself a little shake. “The computers,” she explains, keeping her voice low and stepping closer to him. Strictly so they can hear each other without disturbing anyone else. Pure motives. Totally not about how bright and blue and, yeah, _really_   _bright_  his eyes are. “I need like an hour on one of those. It’s free, right? Is there a list or some kind of log in?”

He straightens up to his full height -- which is, incidentally, a lot taller than her, even with these stupid heels on. “No,” he answers slowly, like he’s working on some kind of puzzle as he talks to her, “you just find an unoccupied computer and open up IE if you want to get online.” 

She makes a disgusted noise. And possibly reacts to the mention of IE with a bit of a full body eye-roll. “Please tell me there are options other than Internet Explorer.”

The incredibly hot librarian just shrugs at her, but it kind of seems like he’s trying not to laugh.

“Oh, my God, it’s like I’m trapped in 2002,” she mutters, throwing a glare at the antiquated computers beside them. 

“What’s wrong with Internet Explorer?” he asks, and if she didn’t know better, she’d think he was teasing her.

Still, it’s physically impossible for her to let _that_  kind of nonsense stand. So she launches into a detailed explanation about how much IE sucks, how inelegant and buggy its code is, and how Microsoft is basically just the worst. It’s possible this recitation is peppered with more than one expletive. She feels really strongly about it, okay? And Hot Librarian Guy just watches her with a quirked eyebrow and kind of a smirk and she has never understood the sexy librarian fantasy before this precise moment.

His amused smile broadens. “The sexy librarian fantasy?” he asks.

Oh, _God_. The one thing that old Goth Felicity and new... blonde-and-sundress-and-heels-and- _whatever_ Felicity have in common? Blushing. Well, that and saying things that are way better left unsaid. She can feel the sudden, burning heat in hear cheeks and she kind of wishes the art history books would kill her. Books can do anything, right? Including murdering those who need it? 

“Um,” she manages, flailing for some kind of immediate subject change. “You librarians are privacy activists, right?” she demands, her tone only very slightly desperate. Because she really wouldn’t be here contemplating a complicated hack on a _Windows 95-_ looking machine if she didn’t need the untraceability that comes with public library computers.

His brow furrows, and goddamn, he’s hot even when he looks confused. “Privacy activists?”

“Yeah,” she says, nodding encouragingly, like maybe he just needs a push in the right direction to remember all the activism, “after the PATRIOT Act? Like, _we won’t report our readers’ habits to The Man --_ that kind of thing?”

He blinks. “I have honestly no idea what you’re talking about right now.”

“Mr. Queen?” asks a quiet, confident voice from just behind Felicity, who jumps at the unexpected new participant in their conversation. She whips around to find a young woman in a surprisingly low-cut dress with a small name tag proclaiming her to be _**Zelda, Librarian**_. Zelda ignores Felicity completely, smiling at Sexy Librarian Guy who is actually named Mr. Queen. Apparently. “I’m sorry about that,” Zelda apologizes. “Are you ready to continue the tour?”

“Oh,” Felicity says, dread pooling in her stomach as she turns back to the bemused man who is _totally_  not wearing a name tag, and is here _touring the freaking library_ , which is maybe just a thing preppy, cashmere-sweating wearing people do? And she just hammered him with a dozen procedural questions and then lectured him about internet browsers.

Great. Awesome.

Sexy Totally-Not-a-Librarian Guy is still grinning at her when he steps away from the circulation desk. He pauses beside her, so close she can smell his piney aftershave, and says quietly, “I’m pretty sure the computer on the end has Chrome.”

The inadvertent “ _Oh, thank God”_ that slips out of her in response has him chuckling as he walks away. Felicity takes a moment to watch, mostly because she’s too mortified to do more than stand there and relive every horrifying moment of her conversation with him. But maybe also a little bit because he’s got an ass that won’t quit.

Then he glances back at her with a genuine smile, and she yelps and turns away, giving herself a moment for an actual, literal facepalm. “Oh, my God,” she moans.

When she finally makes herself move, she picks the computer he’d indicated and, yes, they actually have a not-totally-sucky browser installed. Her cheeks are still a little flushed when she gets started, but she quickly loses herself in the work. She masks the IP, bounces her signal off of several intermediary anonymizers, and grumbles about how freaking slow and terrible the computer is. Then she hacks her way into the servers of several law enforcement agencies and two colleges, removing key components of the code she’d written and Cooper had repeatedly used for hactivism. 

And then she cleans out Cooper’s own computers for good measure, leaving him no copies of her work. She used to wish he’d be smart enough to _stop_  on his own, but _she’s_  smart enough to recognize a lost cause when she sees one.  

Felicity finishes up, then cleans up the poor, sad, old computer a little bit. Unsurprisingly, there are several viruses that the totally un-updated antivirus hasn’t noticed, and some gross spyware. “God, why would someone watch porn in the _library_?” she wonders, barely registering the startled look from the person two terminals over. She erases the browser history, deletes all cookies, and forces the computer to restart. 

She sits back with a satisfied sigh, rolling her neck and her shoulders to release the tension.

“Find what you were looking for?” asks a soft, gravelly voice from behind her.

Startled, Felicity whirls around to find the incredibly sexy Mr. Queen standing right back where he’d been at the start, leaning casually against the circulation desk. And, damn, he leans really well. 

 _How_  is that even a thing?

“Mr. Queen,” she blurts.

“No,” he says with a small smile. “Mr. Queen is my father. I’m Oliver.” With that, he steps forward and offers her his hand. “I didn’t mean to interrupt -- are you done?”

Pushing upright, she blinks at him, shaking his hand -- his big, warm hand -- automatically. “Am I done?” she echoes, wondering what he’s doing back here. There’s no sign of Zelda, and he’s not holding a book or doing anything else that would make sense in a library.

Oliver shrugs. “You said you needed an hour. It’s only been 45 minutes, but you _did_  turn off the computer, so I figured you were done.” He shifts his weight a bit awkwardly. “I could wait if you’re not finished.”

Felicity shakes her head very slight, because she’s not entirely sure what’s happening right now? “Wait for what?” she wonders.

“Well,” Oliver says, and if she’s not mistaken, there’s a hint of a blush on his cheeks, “I was hoping you’d agree to join me for coffee.”

“Coffee,” she echoes. And why can’t she say anything isn’t just repeating what he’s said? But -- wait, what? She steps closer, staring up at his just ridiculously handsome face, trying to put the pieces together in a way that makes sense. “As in...” She trails off, a bolt of nerves hitting her when she realizes that it’s within the realm of possibility that he’s asking her out. “Are you...” she tries, then stops. She takes a shaky breath. “Is this a _date_?”

Oliver nods once. “Yes. I’d like to--” He stops short, frowning, and Felicity figures this is the moment where he realizes his mistake and exits stage left. Instead of stepping away, he inches closer. “I just realized I know a lot about your browser preferences, but I don’t know your name.”

“Felicity,” she says. “Felicity Smoak.”

And then Oliver smiles at her, all warm amusement. “Felicity,” he repeats. “What a beautiful name.”

She’s blushing again, only without the hard edge of embarrassment that makes her want to hide among the stacks of books. This warm, bashful, pleased kind of flush is new to her; she kind of likes it. “Thank you.”

“Felicity,” Oliver says, a little more confidently now, “would you like to get coffee with me? You can tell me all about how Windows is superior to the Mac operating system.”

Felicity scoffs openly at that, then clamps a hand over her mouth. “Sorry,” she whispers, glancing at the few patrons on the computers because that was kind of loud and they’re still in a library. No one seems to have noticed other than Oliver, and instead of finding her awkwardness off-putting, he seems... _charmed_? 

She studies him closely, but doesn’t see anything other than obscenely good genetics and a kind of nervous tension as he watches her, waiting for her answer. 

So she steps forward and takes his hand in hers, tugging him back towards the library’s main entrance. He comes along willingly, and there’s a warm bubble of happiness in her chest as she grins up at him. “There’s a place called Buzzzzz two blocks down,” she says, smiling up at him as they walk, “and we are going to talk a _lot_ about Linux.”

Oliver quirks that unfair eyebrow at her, shifting her hand in his grip to lace their fingers together. “What’s Linux?”

She groans. “You have so much to learn.”

As they step out into the afternoon sunshine, his thumb skims across the back of her hand. “Looking forward to it.”

-30-

_Note:  Sorry, guys, I couldn’t wrap my brain around a way for pre-island/non-island Ollie to end up a librarian, or for Oliver to end up a librarian, so I hope this is a reasonable substitute!_


	4. Without You There Is No Sea, There Is No Shore  ***major character death***

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> geneeste asked: From the writing au meme: 44 (one diagnosed with a terminal illness au). It's terrible, but it doesn't seem like something you'd normally write and so might be a challenge exercise? (Feel free to skip if you're just not into it.)
> 
> Mwuahahaha. ::twirls metaphorical mustache:: Y’all been warned.
> 
> **MAJOR CHARACTER DEATH**

 

**Without You There Is No Sea, There Is No Shore**

 

After the funeral, when he’s looking down the barrel of almost _forty years_  on this godforsaken earth without her, he doesn’t see the small collection of mourners lingering by the cars, or the riot of flowers surrounding her grave. 

All he can see is his memory of her face.

Not her bright smile from their first halting attempts at a date, or her beaming joy the day of their wedding, or even her exhausted, sweat-soaked grin when she held Joey for the first time. No, Oliver’s most vivid memory as he stands at her grave is the brittle, knowing look on her pale face just before the doctor spoke on that awful day almost six months ago. 

When Doctor Argenziano had walked into Felicity’s hospital room, his expression carefully, professionally blank, she’d understood immediately. She’d expected it; she’d _been_  expecting it for weeks.

Somehow, Oliver’d had _no_  idea. He couldn’t even imagine it.

In their lives together before her diagnosis, he’d never been the optimist, never been one to look on the bright side. Felicity, in her eternal optimism and her belief in the goodness of most people -- she’d been the bright side of his entire world. But in the face of her cancer, Oliver had been so completely unable to entertain the idea that it could kill her, so utterly convinced that she would recover, that he’d never seen the worst coming.

Not as her blood counts kept falling. Not as the tumors continued to grow. Not as her the treatments became more and more brutal.

She’d fought so stubbornly for three years, nearly four, even as the treatments took pieces of her away -- her appetite, her hair, her energy. She was hovering just over a hundred pounds during that last stay in the hospital, pale and skinny and tired but still wearing a fuchsia headscarf that Joey bought for her. 

Still smiling for him and for their daughter.

Still _Felicity_.

And so Oliver had no reason to expect anything other than remission. Eventually. The next treatment would shrink the tumors. The next surgery would have clean margins. The next round of bloodwork would show _improvement_. 

It had to work. _Something_  had to work. Because Felicity was young and healthy when it started -- just 39, and the mother of a rambunctious 11 year old. Because she and Oliver had years of parenting Joey left, and then they had _years_  growing old together left. Because Oliver was going to live to 86, and it never,  _ever_  occurred to him that he might spend most of his remaining years alone.

He’d been scared most of the four years she’d been sick. Too scared to face the unnamed _bad_ possibilities as he functioned as best he could -- driving her to and from treatments, taking care of Joey, keeping the rest of the family up to speed on everything. So he’d been scared, yes, but deep down inside, he could never truly believe she could die.

She was _Felicity_.

And then that awful day in her room, the one filled with silk flowers and decorated with Joey’s drawings and cards and pictures, Oliver had looked at his wife of 17 years and he’d seen knowing resignation on her face.

Grief and sorrow and fear, yes, but some strange form of _acceptance_ , too. 

Before Doctor Argenziano even pronounced her death sentence, Oliver had choked on a sob just from the look on Felicity’s face. Then he’d sat in silent disbelief as Felicity and her doctor discussed _time frames_  and _pain management_  and _hospice care_ , and he’d wanted so badly to storm out, to rage against this, but he’d felt his heart crack open in his chest when he saw her expression, when he realized that  _she knew she was dying._

And that was it.

After the doctor left, she’d turned to him with that same sorrowful acceptance on her face and said, “It’s okay.”

“No.” He’d refused, wasn’t ready. Would never _be_  ready for losing Felicity to be  _okay_.

But his Felicity was _Felicity_ even exhausted and in pain and facing her own mortality. She’d been braver than him for as long as he’d known her. And that day she’d tugged on his hand, forcing him to meet her gaze so she could speak. “I don’t want to leave you and Joey, Oliver. _God_ , do I want to stay with you forever.” She’d stopped to take a shaky breath; they’d both been crying by then, hands grasping each other, foreheads leaning together.

“Felicity,” he’d whispered.

Her grip on him had tightened, a faint echo of the strength she used to have in those dexterous hands, but he’d understood the effort and appreciated it. “I know,” she’d said, “but it’s going to be okay.”

He’d been unable to bear any distance between them anymore, standing abruptly and carefully, _so_ carefully, shifting her over in the hospital bed so he could wedge his too-big frame in beside her. He’d pulled her body close, holding her gently because he knew her bones ached from the medication, and her joints ached from the bedrest. When she’d laid her head on his shoulder, he’d buried his face in her scarf. It smelled like the hospital, but underneath that, like _her_. 

They’d held each other and cried for each other, for her fear and pain and for his anger and dread. They’d cried for their teenage daughter, who didn’t deserve to lose a mother. 

“Felicity, I can’t do this without you,” he’d whispered, like a confession.

“You can,” she’d whispered back. “You have so many people who love you and will help you. You just need to let them. _After_. Because, Oliver, Joey’s going to need you.”

The next day, Oliver had taken Felicity home. With Joey’s help, and Donna’a and Thea’s and Lyla’s, he’d taken care of her until she died. 

And now, even with almost six month’s warning, Oliver cannot believe she’s really gone. He held her as she took her last breath two days ago, and he still expects to turn his head and find her standing beside him, where she belongs.

“Dad?”

He inhales sharply, jarred from his spiraling thoughts, his bittersweet memories of the last six months of his beloved’s life. When he turns, his fifteen year old daughter is standing there, her long, chestnut hair pulled back in a ponytail, watching him with red-rimmed eyes. “Joey,” he manages, reaching out a hand.

She takes it, moving to his side. “I miss her already,” Joey whispers. “So much.” And then she looks up at him, winding her arm around his back to lend him her support. “Are you okay, Dad?”

Oliver looks at her, this sweet, smart, beautiful girl who has never reminded him more of Felicity than this moment, when she pushed aside her own grief to help him with his. And he remembers what Felicity said, what she made him promise -- to accept support so he can be a rock for their daughter. 

For the first time in a long time, Oliver doesn’t feel adrift. He doesn’t feel trapped in a world that’s missing sound and color and beauty. The world is missing  _Felicity_ , but there _is_  still sound and color and beauty, because  _Josephine_ is here. 

Felicity is the love of Oliver’s life and he will miss her every second of the next forty years. But Joey is the best thing they ever did, and he can’t fall apart, because his daughter needs him. 

So he pulls her closer, rubbing her back like he used to when she was a little girl. “I miss her, too, Joey. We’ll get each other through this, okay?”

She tilts her face up to him, frowning a little, eyebrows drawn together in confusion. “How?” she asks, her tone plaintive in a way that makes him remember a hundred conversations with the insatiably curious three-year-old Joey. He feels warm for the first time in days, because now when he closes his eyes, he can see Felicity smiling up at him from the floor of their first house, Joey perched in her lap and talking a mile a minute. 

Oliver presses a kiss to his daughter’s forehead. “I’m not sure,” he admits quietly. “But I promise you we will figure it out together, okay?”

Joey nods, swiping her cheeks with the kleenex clutched in her hand. “Okay.”

“We’ll figure it out,” he tells her, and he uses his best Dad Voice, the one that lends certainty and reassurance to every word, “because that was your mother’s last wish for you and me, Joey. I’m not going to let her down.”

Joey straightens up just a bit, in response steel in her spine. Her stubbornness is such a strong echo of her mother that it leaves Oliver breathless. “I’m not going to let her down, either,” Joey promises.

It’s not much, just the stubborn belief of two people who have lost the center of their world, but Oliver figures it’s a good place to start. 

-30-

_Yeah, this kind of got away from me some. #sorrynotsorry?_


	5. Something About the Clouds and Her Mixed, olicity AU, hiker/paramedic

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I accidentally prompted myself, but, hell, at least I wrote something? Inspired by [this silliness](http://jezebel.com/a-woman-pretended-to-be-sick-to-escape-a-hiking-date-an-1775340411).

 

**Something About the Clouds and Her Mixed**

 

When Dig settles the rescue chopper into a clearing near the halfway point of the scenic hiking loop, Oliver slings his bag over his shoulder and hops out. It’s a bright day even through the cloud cover out here in the foothills, and climbing towards the mid-80s already. Oliver is sweating in his uniform even before he climbs up to the nearby trail in search of their patient.

They don’t get many calls like this -- usually a rescue chopper call into the national forest outside of Starling is for something awful like a bear attack, or broken limbs from a fall, or a heart attack from overdoing it. Today’s call is for a sick hiker apparently unable to make the trek back down the foothills to the visitor’s center. That’s a new one, so Oliver doesn’t really know what to expect as he makes it up the last few feet of the steep incline to the reported location.

Instead of a miserable, moaning sick person or a panicking friend desperate for help, Oliver is confronted with a tiny blonde in tiny shorts rushing towards him, apologizing a mile a minute. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m _so_  sorry. You really didn’t have to come all this way. It’s a misunderstanding.” She pauses and wrinkles her nose. “No, that’s not true. It’s a lie. I lied. And now you’re here and you shouldn’t be and I know it doesn’t make up for it, but I am _really_  sorry.”

Oliver blinks, frozen in place for a moment before he snaps out of it to ask, “Miss, are you the one who called for assistance?” When he scans her frame, he notes some bruising along one leg and a few scratches on her upper arm; he also notices how well she’s wearing those khaki shorts, and takes a split second to appreciate the way her bright pink tank top clings to her frame. She’s got her blonde hair pulled back into a neat ponytail, and she’s pushed her sunglasses up to the top of her head.

She’s beautiful.

Especially when she flushes, glancing over her shoulder at a broad-shouldered man sitting on a low rock wall, looking very pointedly in the other direction. Oliver gets the distinct impression that the other man is pouting. “Not exactly,” she answers, turning back to him, and her eyes are just really blue as she looks worriedly up at him. “Ray called.”

Oliver nods and moves past her, heading for the man. “Sorry, we were told it was a woman in distress.”

“It was!” The blonde darts around in front of him, holding a hand up to halt him in place. “Wait, just-- No one’s in distress. Can I just–?”

Oliver frowns at her. “We were called out for a medical emergency.”

The blonde makes an adorable little noise of frustration and reaches for Oliver’s sleeve, tugging ineffectually. “God, you’re huge,” she mutters, then flushes again. “Ignore that,” she orders. “Could you come here for a second so that I can explain?”

Warily, he follows her a few feet down the trail away from the other man. Whenever one party in a domestic situation needs privacy to speak, Oliver’s protective streaks comes out full force. “Miss, I--”

“We’re on a date,” she interrupts, eyes wide. She talks very fast, unleashing a barrage of information that it takes Oliver a moment to sift through. “A bad date. A _hiking_  date -- who goes _hiking_  on a first date? Not the point. It’s a bad date, okay? And I’m a terrible liar, so I should’ve known better. I just -- I wanted to cut this thing short and escape, no drama, no awkward conversations, so I-- I told Ray I wasn’t feeling well. We were just supposed to go back to the car.”

The only sound for the few moments after her hushed confession is a nearby bluebird chirping. “You told him you were sick,” Oliver says slowly, trying to figure out how a small lie to end a date resulted in a _lifeflight_  dispatch. “Okay. But--”

“Why are you here for a 911 call?” Felicity interrupts, nodding and tossing her hands in the air. “I don’t _know_! I just-- I had to--” She covers her face with one hand. “God, this is so embarrassing to explain to the hot paramedic guy, because  _of course_  you couldn’t be, like, a kindly woman with vast experience in bad dates who wouldn’t be sitting there _judging_  me.”

Her words are slightly muffled, but he can understand her anyway and has to bite back a smile. “I’ve had plenty of bad dates.”

She scoffs, dropping her hands from her face to pin him with a skeptical gaze. “Oh, please. Your version of bad date is probably, like, _Oh, my date is perfect, but now the waitress wants me, too_ ,” she argues, “not _my teeny tiny white lie has snowballed wildly out of control and now involves the National Park Service_.”

Oliver has to press his lips together to suppress a smile. “Technically, I’m not with the Service; I work for the County.”

She positively glowers at him in response. “Right, ‘cause _that_  makes this less embarrassing.”

“Look, miss--”

“Felicity,” she interjects, looking miserable now. “Felicity Smoak. I live in Starling. Do you need my ID or something so you can bill me for this? Or -- oh, God, am I going to get arrested?” She turns pale, and Oliver is concerned that she might actually need medical assistance soon if he can’t calm her down.

“Felicity,” he says, “Felicity, listen to me, no one’s getting arrested.” He doesn’t tell her that fraudulent emergency calls are civil offenses that could cost her a lot of money; probably wouldn’t help calm her down. “Can you just connect the dots for me? How did Ray end up calling for emergency services?”

Felicity flushes that delightful pink again, avoids his gaze, and mumbles something so low and fast that he misses it entirely.

“Felicity?” he prompts, just as Dig checks in via the radio, asking for a sitrep. Oliver tilts his head down, reaching up to hold the transmit button on the receiver clipped to his vest. “No backboard needed. Still assessing, over.” Then he turns his attention back to Felicity and crosses his arms, not missing the way her gaze drops to his chest. “Explain.”

She tips her head back, eyes closed, and whines for a moment, before straightening up and looking him dead in the eye. “I had to pee, okay? I told Ray I was sick because he would _not_  stop talking about how I _needed_  to come work for him, and _joking--_ ” She threw in some sarcastic quotes marks with her fingers-- “about just buying my company to make that happen, which, hi, super creepy? And just all around not the kind of conversation you have on a first date. On a _hiking_  first date,” she added, her hands gesticulating to underscore her point, “when you’ve taken a woman out into the wilderness all alone!”

Oliver throws a glare over at Ray, who’s still sitting on the rock pretending to ignore them. “Did he hurt you or threaten you in any way?” Oliver asks, making sure his voice is as low and _non_ -threatening as possible.

Felicity shrugs off his question. “No, not really. Not in the way you mean. I just– There were some red flags and I didn’t want to be on a mountain with the guy anymore, so I said I had to pee.” She’s blushing, her gaze falling away from his as she continues. “I mean, I actually _did_  have to pee? But I’m not a wilderness person, and I really, _really_  didn’t want to get poison ivy on my--” She stops short, pressing her lips together.

Oliver huffs a laugh. “You really don’t,” he agrees. “It’s not fun.”

She quirks an eyebrow her gaze shifting south for a moment. “Have you...?”

“No,” Oliver says, laughter in his voice because he just can’t help it. She’s an unpredictable ray of sunshine on this overcast day. “I learned a long time ago to recognize poison ivy and poison oak, but I’ve treated some patients who made poor choices.”

“Poor choices,” Felicity echoes thoughtfully. “That kind of sums up my day. Anyway, I was wandering for a while, looking for a– for a _spot_ ,” she explains, and he’s never seen anyone blush as brightly as she is right now. “I guess Ray -- he thought when I said I was sick– And then I was gone for a while to-- So he thought--” She closes her eyes and adds, “Intestinal distress.”

Oliver tries very, very hard not to laugh. “He called 911 because he thought you were in the woods stricken with diarrhea,” he surmises.

Stubbornly, she keeps her eyes closed. “Yes. Now will you please go get back on your helicopter and leave me to die of humiliation in peace?”

He watches her for a moment, weighing options. “Felicity, how long is the hike back down to the parking lot?”

Her eyes pop open and she tilts her head. “I’m bad at hiking. I don’t know -- an hour? Two?”

“And did you and your date drive out from Starling together?”

Finally, her flushed cheeks begin to pale. “Oh, frak,” she whispers.

Oliver dips his chin to meet her gaze. “Are you sure you don’t need medical attention?”

She purses her lips as she considers his words, and the overall effect is nearly blinding in its adorableness. “But Ray knows it’s a lie,” she says. “I-- I said a lot of things while we were waiting.” Her brow furrows. “I think I threatened to hack all of his computers and replace his files will porcupines farting.” She winces.

Oliver shakes his head at her, but he’s grinning. He’s definitely never met anyone like her before. “Felicity, we need to get to the helicopter, okay?”

“Are you seriously going to fly me to a hospital to help me escape a really bad date?” she asks, studying him.

He shrugs, unable to explain _why_  he’s offering something that could get him in serious trouble. “We don’t usually come back from these things empty-handed,” he points out.

She gnaws on her lip for a moment, glancing over at Ray before turning back to Oliver. “Yes, okay. I _am_  feeling, like, _super_  sick.”

Oliver can’t quite suppress a surprised laugh. “You’re right -- you’re a terrible liar.”

She grins at him, then holds up one finger. “Hang on a sec?” She walks over to Ray, who looks offended and angry and embarrassed by turns as she explains what’s going on. Oliver can’t quite hear their conversation, but it doesn’t last more than thirty seconds, forty-five tops.

Ray gives Felicity a sharp wave, and turns back to the trail, disappearing into the woods before Felicity has even reached Oliver’s side again. Definitely a jerk, Oliver decides.

Then he looks down at Felicity and holds out a hand for her. “Come on.”

She hesitates just for a second, then takes his hand, following him to the edge of the path before staring wide-eyed down the steep terrain to the waiting chopper. “Oh.”

He looks at her pristine sneakers and the expression of mild terror on her face, then shifts, circling her back with one arm and leaning down for her legs. “Hold on to me tightly,” he says, lifting her into a bridal carry.

Felicity yelps, flinging her arms around his neck. “Are you serious right now?”

Confidently, Oliver picks his way over uneven ground, bringing her down to the chopper and carrying her all the way to the open door. He sets her gently on the floor of the helicopter and steps back to pull the bag of supplies from his shoulder and toss it in the back.

Felicity doesn’t move, watching him with an amused look. “My hero,” she yells over the noise of the chopper, her sarcasm coming through loud and clear.

Oliver just shakes his head at her and taps her legs. “Up and in,” he shouts back.

Once she’s in, Oliver climbs in after her, helping her get buckled in before settling beside her. He looks up at Dig and is not at all surprised to see his friend’s eyebrow quirked in wordless question. Oliver makes sure that Felicity’s paying attention when he leans forwards to shout to Dig, “Patient reported intestinal distress. Let’s go.”

Just as he expected, Diggle is unimpressed but turns back to the controls anyway, and Felicity sputters indignantly beside him.

Then the chopper lifts off, gaining altitude before Dig arcs them away from the hillside.

Felicity goes pale. “Oh, God, I’m afraid of helicopters,” she says, hands clasped into a knot in her lap. “Which is something I just learned,” she adds.

Oliver bumps her shoulder with his. “Everything’s going to be fine, Felicity. I promise.” He offers her his hand. “You can hold onto me.”

She stares at him for a long moment, then nods as her small hand settles into his. “Okay,” she agrees quietly.

-30-


End file.
